Housewarming
by ancarett
Summary: Clark helps Lois settle into her new apartment with unsettling results. Set before "Bride".


Author's Note: Written for 12days_of_clois community's fic exchange on livejournal for burningqueen who requested "post-_Committed_, Lois and Clark finally honestly discuss their feelings." Well, as honestly as these things ever go! (Spoilers up to, but not including "Bride.") Beta-reading and advice courtesy of babettew54!

* * *

"Some housewarming, huh, Clark?" Lois looked around her new place ruefully and took a swig of beer. Outside the floor-to-ceiling window, the nighttime skyline of Metropolis flickered wanly amidst a downpour that thrummed against the glass. Inside the small apartment, one woeful lamp perched on a stack of books, failing in its mission to light up the sparsely furnished living room.

Clark was carefully spinning his almost-full beer bottle in one hand as he sat beside her on the couch. Truth be told, he hadn't expected to see many others help Lois with her move, given that Chloe and Jimmy were meeting with their wedding officiant and Oliver had warned Clark that he was committed to a Queen Industries board meeting in Star City. Still, he could see the hurt in Lois's eyes.

"Come on," he said gently, "you know it's just that I'm the only one dumb enough to not have something better to do on the day you schedule some heavy lifting."

"Sure enough, Smallville," she sassed back half-heartedly and drained her bottle.

Clark took her empty and put it down on the moving box that served as a makeshift coffee table. His brow knit in concern as she snatched his away. "Hey, go easy on that, Lois. You haven't eaten much."

Lois snorted as she started in on his bottle. "Don't worry, Clark. You may be a lightweight, but I can handle a couple of beers. Anyway, who was supposed to pick up a bucket of the Colonel's best while I finished unpacking but somehow managed to mess up that simple assignment?"

Clark ducked his head as he flushed in embarrassment. His excuse had sounded lame, even to his own ears, when he came back to Lois's apartment two hours after he left to pick up some fried chicken with nothing but a couple of bags of junk food hastily purchased at the nearby 7-11 to show for his long absence. He didn't regret helping pull a bus out from under a mudslide on a nearby highway, but it had taken him enough time to clear up the mess on the roadway and the mess he'd made of himself that he hadn't had time to pick up dinner before the restaurant closed.

A firm hand patted him on the shoulder. Clark started and looked up, meeting her understanding eyes just a few inches from his. "S'okay," she assured him. "It's good that you came back is all. I was beginning to feel completely unloved."

Her eyes widened as she thought about what he said. Lois swiftly leaned back into the couch cushions, babbling at top speed. "I mean friendless. You know: a pariah or something. If I have b.o., you'd tell me, wouldn't you, Smallville?"

Clark winced and rose to his feet, pacing around the tiny living room. Two steps and he was in the miniscule kitchen, five steps the other direction and he stood at the threshold of the tiny bedroom. Clark stared in horror at a bed still littered with Lois's delicate unmentionables and moved to pivot away, right into Lois.

"Ah, yeah, didn't quite get all that stuff put away, yet," Lois offered as she peered over his shoulder, hands stuffed into the back pockets of her jeans. "The closet isn't really that big."

Clark mustered enough weak sarcasm to express his lack of surprise at yet another insufficiency in Lois's new apartment. From insisting that she'd be living on her own, instead of at the farm, to signing the lease on her new place had been a matter of days. This quick move-in, just a week before Chloe's wedding, was part and parcel of Lois's way of doing things and not at all to Clark's liking.

"I don't see why you couldn't stay at the farm, Lois. It wouldn't have been that bad," Clark muttered as he turned to look anywhere but at the hastily-made bed dotted with piles of silky bras and panties.

Lois crossed her arms defensively and shoved past him. Ruthlessly, she scooped up all the underwear and shoved it into the overflowing closet. "It wouldn't have worked out, Clark. Trust me, we'd have been like chalk and cheese. . . ," Lois flailed her hands, searching for an appropriate comparison.

"Hot fudge and halibut," Clark offered with a wry smile.

"Exactly!" Lois said triumphantly as she manhandled the closet door closed. With a satisfied smile, she looked around the slightly more presentable bedroom. "Anyway, I don't have to share with anyone and I like that. It's a perfect place for some 'me time'."

Clark followed her example, but with a doubtful expression. "That's good for 'me time', maybe. But don't be planning to have a lot of company. Your place isn't big enough to swing a cat!"

His expression flushed as he thought through the implications of his comment: Lois and company conjured in his mind a picture of her in that slinky red dress he'd helped her zip into. He felt even more uncomfortable as he visualized some nameless guy 'helping' her out of that formfitting dress, here in the tight confines of her bedroom, backing her up to the bed, the two of them falling onto the bed in a tangle of limbs.

Clark cleared his throat and sought to banish the discomfiting images with a mental review of the win/loss stats of the Metropolis football team. Surely it was just embarrassment at thinking of Lois in that way that made him get all hot and bothered at this vivid mental excursion into her possible love life?

Fortunately, Lois hadn't seen his reaction as she was occupied in making the bed. By the time she looked up, Clark had restored his equanimity and his expression. She glanced around at the small room with markedly less triumph than before. "You were the one who insisted that I rent in a 'safe' neighbourhood, Clark. Don't be surprised that all I could afford was a shoebox."

"I'm sorry, Lois." Clark felt bad that he'd ruined her enjoyment of the new apartment with his comments.

"No you're not," she insisted, glaring at Clark as she shoved through the bedroom doorway past him. She stomped off to the kitchen where she busily, if pointlessly, began opening and closing near-empty drawers and cupboards. "It's late, Clark, maybe you should head home."

Just outside the plate glass, water thrummed down out of the heavy clouds. Clark could see the expanse of sky exposed by the windows, with rain clouds stretching on seemingly forever, illuminated by the muted lights of the sprawling city.

"You'd send me out in that?" Clark asked not because the rain would bother him, but because he hated to leave Lois when she was angry. She held a grudge far past the point that most people would and he knew she'd come up with a million ways to make his life at the _Planet_ insufferable. Rather, she'd try, he grinned to himself. "You wouldn't even do that to Shelby, now, would you?"

"Of course not. I _like_ Shelby," Lois retorted as she shouldered past Clark to look at the window. Thunder roared as a gust of wind blew the rain heavily against the glass and she started back almost infinitesimally. "It'd serve you right if I did, Smallville. But you'd probably be struck by lightning or blown off the road or disappear into another one of your mysterious time-space anomalies or wherever the heck else it is you hare off to when you're supposed to be fetching food and your mother would never forgive me. . . ."

Clark relaxed. Lois on a roll was a Lois who'd forgiven him.

"So, since I'm the guest, do I get the bed?" He teased, walking over to join her at the window. Somehow it felt natural to drape one arm over her shoulder and pull her in close against him as they stared out into the night.

Lois held herself very stiff for a moment, looking up at Clark with eyes that appeared darkly luminous in the dim light of the room. She sighed and looked down for a long while before finally acquiescing to the hug.

Clark repeated his question with less surety. This time, Lois shook her head emphatically no, grinning with the saucy style that was uniquely hers. "Heck, no. I sure didn't get the bed the last time we played sleepover at the farm, Smallville. No way are you putting me out of my own bed my first night in it."

Clark regarded the couch with a frown. "That couch looks awfully short, Lois. I'd probably be better off taking my chances on the road back home."

Lois glanced over to the furniture in question with a secretive smile. "Have you no sense of adventure, Smallville? We'll stay up as late as we can and whoever craps out first on the couch loses."

Clark cocked his head towards Lois. "Doing what? You don't have cable or internet, yet, the Playstation's back at the farm and I sure don't remember hauling in any games of Scrabble or Monopoly. I am so _not_ doing another _Whitesnake_ sing-along."

Lois sighed heavily as she crossed one arm over her torso and turned her gaze out on the cityscape before them. "I don't suppose you learned anything about creativity and self-reliance on that farm of yours did you? We'll play games. The old-fashioned kind you do with your mind. It'll be good for you, Clark. Sharpen that little-used brain of yours."

"Ha-ha," he intoned humourlessly. Lightning cracked outside and Lois startled slightly again. Clark looked closely at her, watching how her fingers worked restlessly on her forearms, tendons standing out painfully against her pale skin.

"Something's bothering you," he said flatly.

Lois looked at Clark defensively and put on a cheesily over-the-top grin: the kind that she used when she was busy stealing his coffee or redirecting him from a story that she wanted for herself. "Don't be silly, Clark. If anything's bothering me, it's you! I mean, talk about a party-pooper. Sheesh!"

Clark slipped his arm around her waist and clasped one hand over her fidgeting fingers. "This isn't a party and this isn't like you, Lois. What's up? You're jumpy as a cat tonight."

Her eyes shifted over to meet his, then raced swiftly away. Another peal of thunder sounded and he felt her shiver. Their eyes met and he saw a deep pool of dread. In the dim lighting of the room, with the storm beating down outside, it wasn't hard for Clark to see what set her off.

"You're remembering that basement, aren't you, Lois?" he asked softly as he led her over to the couch.

Her muscles moved jerkily underneath his touch, attempting to slip his grasp. Clark moved one hand to encircle her wrist. "It's okay, Lois."

Lois stopped fighting against his hold. She closed her eyes and leaned back into the cushions of the sofa. "No, it isn't, Clark. It's a great big awful horrible feeling that just hangs over me. When I go down into the storage room at _The Planet_. When the lights go out in the movie theatre. When lightning strikes. I. . . I just lose it a little. I remember that crazy guy threatening us, hurting you. . . and I hate it."

Clark let his thumb slide soothingly over the soft skin of her inner wrist, feeling the pulse beat strongly beneath his touch and the warmth of his hand on her wrist releasing a wafting scent of rich, autumnal perfume. Clark felt a strange temptation to lift that wrist to his lips and see if her skin would taste of that heady perfume, the shook his head to clear his mind.

"I understand," Clark offered in a voice that was a little slow and forced as he strove to regain his focus and remember that this was Lois, his friend and co-worker, not someone he was dating, for heaven's sake! "You're just having a delayed reaction, Lois. It was a traumatic situation and anyone would be affected."

She glared at him fiercely. "No, you don't understand, Clark! I was stuck there, helpless, and I couldn't do anything but hurt you when I opened my big yap. It was like my worst nightmare."

Clark reached with his free hand to circle her shoulders, pulling Lois close for another hug. She resisted momentarily before relaxing into his embrace. "You weren't all bad, Lois. You even said you loved me," he teased, hoping to make her rise to the bait in her usual fighting spirit.

Instead, Lois stiffened at his jibe, looking up at him with genuine hurt. Clark found himself regretting bringing up that memory and he hastened to add, "I was lucky that you'd gotten rid of the lie detector by then, so that didn't hurt at all!"

"Don't even joke about that, okay, Clark?"

He could feel by the rigidity of her body that his offhand remark had upset Lois all over again. She wrenched her hand against his, clearly trying to pull out of his grasp and rise from the sofa. Clark turned so that both of his hands encased hers and Lois abandoned her fruitless struggle.

"We can't go on the rest of our lives not talking about things, Lois," Clark said in a reasonable tone. They sat quietly for a while with the steady rain outside the only sound in the room. Clark found himself idly rubbing the back of her hand, over and over, marveling at how its length and strength was easily encompassed within his own. Lois did such a great job of pretending that she was some invincible wonder of a woman that even Clark tended to forget she was fragile, until a moment like this.

Lois stole brief glances at his face as he continued to rub her hand. Clark wasn't sure if she was preparing for some big attack or if he had something on his nose. He got his answer when she narrowed her eyes in determination and renewed her attempt to break free from his hold. "You know, you say we can't go the rest of our lives not talking about things? I don't see why not. It's a policy that served me well so far. Watch and learn, little grasshopper!"

Clark's lips curved in a reluctant smile. Typical Lois, full of bravado! He cleared his throat and tried again. "Come on, Lois. At _The Planet_ we're partners. . ."

"Hah!" Lois interjected with an incredulous smirk as she leaned back into the couch, curling her feet up beneath her. "You wish. Me? Heap big reporter. You? Clueless copy boy. It's like Mars and Venus for the working world, Smallville: we come from different planets!"

Clark rolled his eyes. If only Lois knew how apt that last comment was! "Okay, we're co-workers and we have to work together a lot. . ." Lois opened her mouth to interject so Clark amended his term, "sometimes. And I don't want it to be awkward. You're my friend and I don't have a lot of those to spare."

Lois had given up the fight to free her hand from his grasp and was leaning a little bit towards him. "Don' worry, Smallville," she reassured him as she yawned slightly. "I promise not to hold it against you that you're so easy to fool about things. It's kinda cute!"

"Let me see if I've got this right: Lois Lane thinks I'm cute?"

Lois chuckled softly, then let her eyes drift closed. "I think you talk too much, Clark Kent."

Clark nudged her with his shoulder. "Hey, don't fall asleep on me! What about those brain games, Lois? Winner gets the bed, remember?"

Lois smiled sweetly. "That's alright. This is a sofa bed."

Clark knew he was lost as she closed her eyes and snuggled against him. He dropped her hand and moved his arm around her shoulders to cradle her gently. The fall of brown hair over his chest was almost hypnotic in the dim light and he thought he could watch it for hours.

But after a while, he knew she'd start feeling cramped nestled against his side. Clark gently picked Lois up in his arms and carried her to the bedroom. She protested in a mumble as he slipped her shoes off and pulled the comforter up over her shoulder. "Night, Lois." He leaned in close, tempted, again, to press his lips to her skin. Then Clark frowned. What was he thinking? This was Lois! At the very least, he'd wake her up out of the restful slumber she'd given into. At the worst, she'd be mad at him for days. Clark sighed and stepped back from the surprisingly tempting figure on the bed.

"Night, Clark," Lois sighed as she rolled over, oblivious to his internal struggle. She shoved her cheek deeply into the pillow with a contented purr that segued into a ladylike but definite snore. Clark chuckled as he headed out through the living room, shaking his head bemusedly at the sofa bed before he raced through the raindrops back to the farmhouse and his own bed where he lay awake for the longest time.


End file.
